U2 soils Croke Park, embarrasses GAA

Croke Park in Dublin, one of the largest venues in Europe, will be closed to the GAA for three days because of U2 performances.

Not content with cheating the Irish taxman out of millions of euro each year, U2 are now responsible for a major embarrassment for the GAA.

Last Sunday’s thrilling Leinster football final ended in a narrow win for Dublin over a brave Kildare side, and a good job too.

Croke Park you see is unavailable for any GAA matches, including a Dublin-Kildare replay, this weekend because Bono and the Tax Cheats are in town.

They are paying the GAA something in the region of €3 million for the use of Croker for three nights, a mere pittance next to the tax they don’t pay into our faltering economy.

As a result of the demands imposed by U2’s egotistical stage show, the Croke Park pitch had to be dug up in the immediate aftermath of last Sunday’s game.

The match was barely over when the bulldozers descended on the David Stand end of the ground and began ripping the sacred sod to shreds.

The last fans leaving the stadium looked on in amusement as the diggers went to work to prepare for a “special” surface requested by U2 for their concerts, which have not sold out yet as a matter of interest.

The ground will next be available to its GAA owners for the August weekend when it is due to stage the All-Ireland football quarterfinals, a series that will include the aforementioned Dubs.

By the time Bernard Brogan and Co. get back in the groove a new pitch will have been laid -- a British pitch, much to the amusement of some GAA watchers here at home.

Turns out the GAA have awarded the million euro contract for the new playing surface to a specialist turf farm in the very English town of Scunthorpe, which means that this year’s All-Ireland finals will be played on British soil.

The GAA are adamant that no Irish turf farm could supply the amount of grass needed for Croker, and they are not amused at the suggestion that the patriots who play our games will be asked to play on Brit soil.

One Fianna Fail senator is not taken by the story either. Marl Daly, whoever he is, had this to say about the subject when interviewed for Tuesday’s Irish Independent.

“I think this is symbolically a terrible signal for the GAA to be sending out. The GAA are our national sporting institution and Croke Park is our national stadium,” said the good senator.

“Given the history of the stadium and the pitch I think the GAA should be doing more to source sod from within Ireland rather than importing it.

“I’m not sure anyone involved in the GAA would be too comfortable with the notion of the All-Ireland finals being played on British soil.”

Thanks to U2 they’ll have to get on with it when Gaelic games return to Croker in August -- and that’s another good reason to dislike Bono and the Tax Cheats.